January 24: Toronto Poetry Slam

I went to the Toronto Poetry Slam qualifier for the Canadian Individual Poetry Slam (CIPS) Championships at the Supermarket.

I was asked to be judge. It was the first time I had ever been to a poetry slam so I uniquely unqualified to be judge but that was fine.

I enjoyed some great chicken and shrimp pad thai along with Lagunitas IPA.

Jubilee was a great host and kept things going smoothly.

There were ten poets who presented a 3-minute poem and then a 1-minute poem.

Then there was a cut and six poets presented a 2-minute poem and finally three poets presented a 4-minute poem.

Here are the names of the poets:

• SPIN El Poeta
• Justus
• Nana
• Londzo
• Ayla
• Same Difference
• Ifrah Hussein
• Optimus Rhyme
• Trevor Abes
• Bassam
• yestefania

Andre Prefontaine gave us some poems to start the second half. He had some funny bits but he was not the best poet of the night.

There were two poets who were "sacrifices", presented poems that were judged but not competing themselves. I think the first was Tasha Receno who was great but hard to tell how to score her since she was first.

It was hard to be a judge as I was always thinking about numbers.  I would get a number in my head and adjust it as the poem went along.

Our numbers were made public and mine were consistently the lowest.

I really didn't like Ifrah Hussein and she won. She twice commented on my low scores from the stage. Sorry, I don't like poems about child abuse and female genital mutilation.My favourite was Optimus Rhyme and he didn't make the first cut. He had a poem about a Tinder that was about much more and another about Tim Horton's vs. Starbucks. He had some rhymes.

I really Justus and he finished second. He had a great poem about his his roots going back to Rwanda via Uganda while being Canadian.

I will say that poets looked like Toronto. The winner was from Somalia, Justus is from Uganda, Bassam finished third and he's a Lebanese Jew.

One guy congratulated me on my voting.

I would like to see more poetry slams but I think as an anonymous audience member.

I am still looking for poetry that rhymes.